Growing Tables

Wednesday, October 29, 2014

As part of our local Food Day events this year, we decided to promote a CalFresh Challenge. The Challenge asks participants to live for a week (or five days, in our case) on the average benefits provided by CalFresh, California's version of the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). In California, that means participants were expected to spend no more than five dollars a day for all their food and beverages.

My goal was to not only stay within budget, but also continue to eat (and serve my family) healthy meals including adequate fruits and vegetables. So how did I do?I managed to stay under the $75 limit (three people at five dollars a day for five days). I didn't even struggle to do it. We ate similar food to what we typically eat and even had enough left at the end of the week for a very simple breakfast out (six dollars for two of us). But I'm under no illusion that it is that "easy" for most people who actually live on the CalFresh budget day after day, often for many months at a time. I have some major advantages over people living with poverty and food insecurity. Among them:1. I have a reliable car and money for gas. These two things are not a given for many families living with food insecurity. In our region, many people live 10 miles or more from the nearest supermarket. Without adequate transportation, they are forced to buy their food from smaller markets that offer fewer healthy options AND tend to charge higher prices because of their smaller scale.2. I know how to cook. Again, this is not a given. Many adults have grown up on packaged foods and don't know how to create healthy meals from whole foods. Because our agricultural subsidy system rewards commodity growers, foods like boxed mac and cheese and ramen noodles are incredibly cheap while offering almost no nutritional value beyond calories. By knowing how to cook, I can make foods with much higher nutritional value from cheap ingredients like onions, potatoes, and frozen corn (which became a corn chowder at $1/meal last week).3. I have a full, working kitchen in my house. I don't only know how to cook, but I have all the tools I need to cook most things: a working refrigerator, stove, and oven, plus pots and pans and knives and wooden spoons. If you are homeless or living in a hotel room or couch-surfing with a different friend every week because you have lost your house to the mortgage crisis or your job to the recession or your whole way of life because of a catastrophic illness, you probably don't have access to a full kitchen. Maybe you have a mini-fridge, a hotplate, and a microwave in your hotel room. Or maybe you have an open fire. Either way, you aren't going to be cooking a lot of made-from-scratch meals and you can't count on being able to store food, whether we're talking about ingredients or leftovers. For me, I could make the giant pot of corn chowder at the beginning of the week, knowing I could portion it into containers and keep them in the fridge for lunches throughout the week.4. I eat a mostly-vegetarian diet. I eat fish and other seafood somewhere between two and four meals a month usually. Otherwise, I don't eat any kind of meat. During the Challenge, I didn't buy or eat any fish, so my proteins were all much cheaper than almost any cut of meat you can find. We had omelettes one night and even though I purchased local Alexandre eggs, they still only cost $3 for all of our omelettes. We had tofu another night -- at a buck-fifty a pound, our main course cost all of 65 cents per person once I added in the cost of seasoning and the oil for pan-frying.I do, of course, have even more advantages -- I don't work two jobs, I don't work swing shifts, I don't have a job that leaves me physically exhausted at the end of the day -- but the four discussed here helped me stay within budget without much trouble.The causes of poverty and food insecurity are systemic and closely related. The effects of food insecurity are devastating -- people who do not get adequate nutrition get sick more often, can't concentrate as well at school or a job, and simply can't live up to their full potential.One in seven Americans relies on SNAP. One in seven Americans is at risk of falling below their potential. It doesn't have to be this way.

Friday, October 17, 2014

So you've taken the first step and registered to be part of the 2014 DNATL CalFresh Challenge from October 20th to 24th. (What? You haven't registered yet? Register here!) You've committed to spending just $5 per day on all of your food and beverages.What next?Unless you're used to living on a tight food budget, you might be getting anxious about what you'll eat next week. We've put together some tips to help you be successful.First, rethink your drinks. Consider sticking to water during the Challenge! It's the most cost-effective choice. But if you are used to grabbing a latte (at $3.50) on the way to work and can't give up the caffeine, what are some alternatives that will fit your new budget? If you often relax at the end of the day with a glass of wine or beer, you should stock up on Two Buck Chuck or figure out a replacement. Although you certainly can find beer to fit a $5/day budget, think carefully before you commit 15-20% of your total food budget to alcohol. The cost of juice, soda, and sports drinks also adds up quickly while adding lots of sugar and not much nutrition.

Second, PLAN. Figure out a menu for the five days of the challenge. Some things to consider:

Meat tends to be expensive, so participating in Meatless Monday (and maybe Wednesday and Thursday, too) will help you stay on budget

Cheaper protein alternatives include beans, eggs, and tofu

Try to incorporate at least five servings of fruits and vegetables a day -- a vegetable and bean soup could be a great part of this

Don't forget to plan breakfasts and lunches -- if you choose well, these can be very cheap meals

Write out your menu, make a corresponding shopping list, and STICK TO IT at the store

Third, make ahead in bulk. If you can make a big pot of soup that can be dinner one night and lunch for a few days as well, you won't find yourself hungry without a quick, easy option within your budget. Some other ideas:

Hard-boil five eggs at the beginning of the week for your breakfast or lunch (even super-premium pastured eggs only cost about 50 cents each)

Cut up carrot and celery sticks for the whole week and store them in a container of water in the refrigerator -- you'll have a quick veggie snack or lunch component that will stay fresh all week

Re-use leftovers creatively

Fourth, remember why you're doing this Challenge. The CalFresh Challenge isn't about winning or losing. It's not a competition. The goal is for you to gain new understanding of the lives of people living with food insecurity. If you absolutely have to attend a business lunch and your meal consumes three days worth of your CalFresh budget? Take a deep breath, enjoy the meal, and take $1.50 out of your Challenge budget to represent the lunch you would have had otherwise. Just remember that someone who actually lives with a CalFresh budget wouldn't have that option and think about what that would mean for feeling included at work functions.

Fifth, join in one of our Food Day community dinners on Friday! Even though you're supposed to avoid free meals during the CalFresh Challenge, make this one exception. We'll be showing A Place at the Table, a movie about hunger in America, and providing a free dinner in Crescent City, Gasquet, Klamath, and Smith River. Consider sharing your Challenge experience during the community conversation after the movie. Find details about the showings here and take a couple bucks out of your budget to account for the dinner.

If you're struggling to find low-cost recipes, check out USDA's recipe finder. Most of the recipes on their page are geared toward low-income food budgets. Googling "low budget recipes" will also net hundreds of low-budget, but very tasty recipes.

Thank you for participating in the CalFresh Challenge! We wish you happy eating and hope you share what you learn with others.

Thursday, September 25, 2014

This is the warning label that was proposed to
appear on all sugar-sweetened beverages including soda, sports drinks, energy
drinks, and other sugary beverages.

Sugar-sweetened beverages are the largest
contributor of added calories in American diets. These beverages and the
consumption of “liquid sugar” pose unique health risks, many of which consumers
are unaware of. According to the California Center for Public Health Advocacy
(CCPHA), drinking one soda per day increases the risk for obesity in adults by
27 percent, and a child’s risk by 55 percent. The average American consumes
over 38 pounds of sugar per year JUST from
sugar-sweetened beverages.

38.6 pounds of sugar

There is an increasing amount of research linking
sugary drink consumption to rising rates of diet-related diseases. According to
a recent Change Lab Solutions webinar, unless the obesity
epidemic is reversed, 1 in 3 children born after the year 2000 will develop
type 2 diabetes in their lifetime. Almost half of all Latino and
African-American children will develop type 2 diabetes if current trends
continue. The effects of diabetes can be extremely serious, most commonly
causing blindness, amputations, insulin shot dependence, kidney failure and
nerve damage.

The beverage industry is intentionally targeting
young people in their advertising, especially African-American and Latino
youth. Higher exposure equals higher consumption. Something has to be done.

In February of this year, State Senator Bill
Monning introduced the first legislation in the U.S. requiring safety warning
labels on sugary beverages sold in California. The Senator, among other
supporters of SB 1000 claim that this legislation will give
consumers the essential information they need to make healthy and informed
choices. CCPHA has been a leader in this movement, and has support from
almost every major state newspaper, over 150 different organizations in
California, and 74% of Californians.

SB 1000 continued on, but eventually the bill was
voted down in the California State Assembly in an 8-7 vote. The bill passed the
California State Senate, but fell short in the State Assembly’s Health
Committee because of strong opposition from the beverage industry. With 74% of
Californians in support of this legislation, it is clear that people want to be
informed, but the beverage industry is resisting transparency.

The warning label isn’t the one answer to our
nations sugar-sweetened beverage addiction. However, it is a first step. The
purpose of the warning label is to guide the consumer’s attention to specific products,
so that they can make informed choices. The warning label, as an authoritative
statement from the State, aims to educate consumers. The label states a proven
scientific fact. This is an early strategy to change social norms, according to
the CCPHA.

For example, the Surgeon General warning on
cigarette packaging was put on at the peak of cigarette consumption. After this
label appeared on all cigarette packaging, consumption declined. Two-thirds of
smokers say the warning label is an “important source of health information,
decreases the attractiveness of the product, and is strongly associated with
the desire and intention to quit”. This is the exact outcome we hope will
be a result of a warning label on sugary drinks, and this is the reason the beverage
lobby is so opposed. They know it will work.

Big Soda also knows that people are angry, and we
want change. This is why the three largest soda companies (Coca-Cola, PepsiCo
and the Dr. Pepper Snapple Group) pledged at the 10th annual Clinton Initiative to cut
the number of sugary drink calories that Americans consume by one-fifth in
about a decade. How will they do this? They claim, “through a combination of
marketing, distribution and packaging”. Their plans include expanding
low-calorie and no-calorie drink selections, selling smaller portions of
drinks, and using marketing and promotional skills to help educate consumers
and encourage them to reduce the calories they’re drinking.

The beverage industry is attempting to distract the
public from the fact that they lobbied against SB 1000 and that in the midst of
making this pledge, they are pouring money and resources into fighting
soda tax initiatives, which aim to reduce calories consumed by sugary beverages
and educate consumers. The goals of SB 1000 and the proposed soda tax are
the same as those outlined in Big Soda’s pledge.

The problem is that the beverage industry is more
interested in protecting sales and saving face than in working together and the
health of the American public. Sales of sugary drinks have been declining in
recent years, so soda companies have expanded to offer energy drinks,
vitamin-enhanced waters and juices. The market is already heading in the
direction of healthier choices, so they’re essentially “promising what’s going
to happen anyway”, according to Kelly Brownell, an expert on obesity at Duke
University.

If the three biggest soda companies are sincerely
interested in decreasing consumption of calories by sugar-sweetened beverages
and the education of consumers, shouldn’t they be in support of legislation
that will achieve those goals?

Even if these soda companies do focus on lower-calorie and smaller sizes
of sweetened beverages, there are still many sugary drinks that are perceived
as healthy by consumers. For example, juices with added sugar, or
vitamin-enhanced “waters” can contain just as much sugar as a soda. The warning
label on these drinks would equip the consumer with the information they need
to make educated choices.

Luckily, CCPHA isn’t ready to give up the fight. They are confident that
SB 1000 will be reintroduced in 2015, after “continued grassroots organizing,
expanding organizational support, and increased community education”. In the
meantime, spread the word, drink water, and voice your support!

Monday, August 4, 2014

With abundant local produce choices and pleasant weather, summer is a great time to focus on healthy eating and getting active outdoors.

First 5 California's Hands-On Health Express aims to empower families to do just that. The Hands-On Health Express is an award-winning bilingual children's exhibit. The van travels across California, inspiring families to eat more nutritious foods and incorporate physical activity into their daily routines.

The traveling exhibit features "Edu-tainers", who educate and empower families using interactive games, activities and a pretend farmers market.

The Hands-On Health Express will be traveling to Del Norte County later this week. The traveling exhibit will be located at:First 5 Family Resource Center 494 Pacific Avenue, Crescent CityThursday, August 7th 1pm-5pm.

Don't miss out on this opportunity. There will be fantastic resources for families and children focused on healthy eating and active living!

Friday, June 20, 2014

“The School Lunch Debate” has been all over the
news since a House subcommittee approved a measure allowing school districts with proven economic hardship to temporarily opt
out of the Healthy Hunger-Free Kids Act nutrition standards passed in 2010. The
new measure would allow schools to sidestep new standards for lower-sodium and
100% whole grains in meals. GOP leaders and the School Nutrition Association,
which represents school food service directors and food suppliers, claim that
the new requirements are unattainable. They are saying that kids aren’t
interested in the healthy options; therefore the schools are losing large
amounts of money due to waste. There is also concern about effectively reducing
the amounts of sodium and other preservatives.

According to NPR, about a month ago, the USDA decided to relax its
guidelines on whole grains by “offering a two-year extension for schools that can 'demonstrate significant challenges in serving whole-grain rich pastas' to continue serving 'traditional enriched pasta products' for up to two more years as the food industry develops better whole-grain pasta products for schools".

Supporters of upholding the Healthy Hunger-Free
Kids Act nutrition standards include the First Lady Michelle Obama, Secretary
of Agriculture Tom Vilsack, the National Education Association, the American
Medical Association, and the American Heart Association.

Education paired with healthy options could be the
answer to healthier students and less food waste. Kids are more likely
to eat fruits and vegetables that they’re familiar with, and toss out those
that they don’t know. Research has shown that kids need to be exposed to a new
food 10-15 times, before they are likely to try and acquire a taste for it. More than 40,000 schools across the U.S. are
currently engaging in farm-to-school activities. Students who are introduced to
new foods in the classroom or school garden are more inclined to try them in
the cafeteria. Education is a powerful and effective preventative measure to
combat diet-related disease.

Paying extra for more nutritious foods in our schools costs much less
than the $14 billion per year spent on treating conditions
such as type-2 diabetes and hypertension in children. One in three children in
the U.S. is currently overweight or obese, and one in three children will
eventually develop diabetes if current trends continue. The answer
shouldn’t be taking away these standards for nutrition, but instead figuring
out ways to help schools achieve them more easily, and with less waste.

Monday, June 16, 2014

Eating seasonal produce grown close to home is an important
contribution that anyone can make to a healthy local food system. As an added bonus, seasonal produce is fresher, tastes better, and is often cheaper than
its out-of-season counterparts. However, feeling
comfortable identifying, purchasing, and preparing produce that’s in season is
not a reality for many people.

Education is a key piece to building a healthy and conscious
community. Nutrition education can be incorporated into any subject matter. There’s
no doubt that it is beneficial to expose children to various fruits and
vegetables and healthy lifestyle choices at an early age. According to
Champions for Change,
research has shown that eating a colorful variety of fruits and vegetables and
getting at least 60 minutes of physical activity daily helps children to
maintain a healthy weight and lower risk for serious health problems.

Harvest of the Month aims to increase access, preference and consumption of local and seasonal produce.
The primary audience is students of any age, but there are also components
included for use with families and communities. The program was originally
created by several local school districts in California as part of a broader
nutrition education program targeting low-income students, but was launched as
a statewide effort in 2005 by the California Department of Public Health. Harvest of the Month features resources
that can be used in a wide variety of settings including schools, daycares and
farmers markets, to name a few. These materials include tasting recipes,
history, nutrition information, family and community newsletters (in Spanish
and English), and activities relating to the featured produce.

Harvest of the Month currently reaches 2,900 students in Del
Norte schools each month. The program in Del Norte is supported by the
Community Alliance for Family Farmers (CAFF) and sources produce from local growers
whenever possible. This creates and builds upon partnerships between growers
and the greater community, while creating long-term sustainability. Since the
implementation of the program, an increase in consumption of fruits and
vegetables over the course of one school year has been recorded by surveying 4th,
5th, and 9th grade students.

The Harvest of the Month Program was funded in the past by
the Network for a Healthy California. However, they have shifted their focus
away from schools and these funds are no longer available to support this
program. The Community Food Council for DNATL, along with CAFF and the Del
Norte County School District, has been committed to ongoing efforts to keep
Harvest of the Month in our schools. These efforts have included creating
community partnerships, fundraising, exploring alternative funding sources, and
spreading the Harvest of the Month message to the whole community.

In addition,
the Food Council is working in partnership with SNAP-Ed at the Department of
Health and Human Services to implement new Harvest of the Month Programs and
expand those that already exist in Home Daycares, Preschools and Head Starts in
DNATL. We have created a resource guide for the Harvest of the Month Program
that can be used by 0 to 5 providers. The guide includes tasting recipes, educator
guides with produce information, physical activity for the classroom, and poems
about enjoying seasonal produce. The Food Council recently attended the Child
Care Council’s Annual Home Daycare Providers Conference and gave fifty-eight
copies of our resource guide to the Home Daycare Providers in DNATL. We are also
providing all of the preschool and head start providers with resource guides for
the upcoming school year. One of
the goals of the Food Council in the coming year is to support 0 to 5 providers
in effectively using these resource guides and being able to more easily
incorporate the Harvest of the Month Program into their already packed
curriculums.

The Community Food Council is working to build a vibrant and
sustainable food system in DNATL in various ways. Through promoting the Harvest
of the Month program, we are aiming to have a positive influence on students
and their families. The larger goal is to ensure that they will be surrounded
by healthy choices and possess the knowledge and skills to support a nutritious
and active lifestyle for years to come.

Wednesday, June 11, 2014

Recently at the Youth and Family Fair, representatives of the Community Food Council conducted a survey where participants identified the biggest struggles they face when trying to put a healthy meal on the table. Overwhelmingly, the results showed that time, money, and skills/knowledge were the most significant barriers to eating healthy. This was just a recent survey, but it confirmed something that we've suspected to be true for a long time: one of the biggest problems people face is simply not knowing what healthy food is, or how to cook it.

As a council, we have often discussed the issue of the lack of knowledge around healthy eating. It seems like it always came up in every discussion we had about how to properly address this issue and how to help: there needs to be a consistent and comprehensive method of teaching basic skills for all aspects of food. With the help of excellent volunteers, like Paul and Julie Jo of Ocean Air Farms, we had been able to hold a few educational workshops on growing your own food. When Food Day 2013 rolled around, proclaiming "education" as the theme for the holiday's festivities, we decided to put a strong focus on food education, from growing your own, to cooking, preserving, and even foraging. on Food Day 2013, we had our first big outing of "DIY Food Workshops." That day we had a whole day devoted to DIY workshops, including mushroom foraging, fermentation, basic kitchen skills, gardening skills, raising chickens, other food foraging, and canning. Our day of DIY was a great success, so the Food Council decided to make these DIY Food Workshops an on-going event.

Starting in January of 2014, the Community Food Council kicked off its series of DIY Food Workshops with a two-part workshop on consecutive weekends; the subject was home canning, including water bath canning and pressure canning. We were lucky enough to have a representative from the UC Cooperative Extension, Deb Giraud, come down to lead this workshop. Our impressive turn out of 30+ people learned the in's and out's of two different types of canning, got hands-on by canning their own veggies and beans, and were able to take home some basic canning supplies. After coming together for this workshop, a small contingent of the attendees followed it up by attending the Master Food Preserver's courses in Humboldt County.

Since our first DIY class, we've since held two more, in March and May. Paul Madeira teamed up with Andrea Souther of the National Resource Conservation Service in March to lead the workshop on Spring Gardening. Paul shared insight with attendees based on his extensive experience with local farming, while Andrea brought equipment to test attendees' soil samples for pH and taught about soil conservation methods. We continued with the theme of gardening into our May workshop, where Annie McAleenan of Annie Mac's Family Produce taught about all the exciting potential of Container Gardening. Again, attendees got to get hands on, planting a straw bale, numerous hanging bucket planters, a pallet, and a multitude of other containers that Annie Mac uses for her own home farm.

The Community Food Council will continue these DIY Food Workshops every other month into the future. We have yet to determine the subject and speaker for our July workshop, so stay tuned to this blog, our Facebook page, and look for flyers around town! As we continue the workshops every other month, expect these topics to come up:

Fermentation

Cheese making

Mushroom foraging

Native plant foraging

Orchard care

Permaculture/sustainable design

and a multitude of cooking subjects

We hope you get the chance to attend one of our workshops in the future. All workshops are free of charge, open to anybody, and will always have raffle prizes to give away! If you have specific topics you'd like to see us feature in a workshop, please feel encouraged to write us at foodcouncildnatl@gmail.com or on our Facebook page: "Community Food Council for Del Norte and Adjacent Tribal Lands."